[Fear Nothing]

(Original post by TheSownRose)
Having lived in England all my life and spent considerable time in winter in places like Austria and Germany, where it's infinitely more efficient in the snow, I spent some time trying to answer this and only came up with one core reason: it just doesn't snow and settle often enough in the UK.

It's all about duration and investment. They don't grit roads in Austria (ineffective when the temperature is below -5C anyway); all the cars have snow chains - in fact, authorities stop you driving through certain areas unless you have snow chains. And it's thick snow for weeks on end and every year, so items such as snow chains are worthy investments - they're going to be useful and necessary for getting through the winter; imagine being told you have to buy and fit snow chains on your car for the two or three days in the year it'll be useful, and indeed will be stopped from travelling if you don't. Doesn't seem quite so justifiable here, does it?

So, you're not going to be personally prepared ... so why don't the councils have snow ploughs and better gritting systems? Same reason, really; they're not going to spend millions every year on snow ploughs and paying full-time gritters for a few days of worth. Train companies aren't fitting snow ploughs to their trains and getting spare carriages on the side to cope with breakdowns for little use.

A concise and really great answer. Rep to you

[Fear Nothing]

(Original post by sophie_c)
Haha I know!
I'm from the north of scotland, and we quite often lol at how London etc can't cope with snow! I came home last night from uni, bus and 2 trains, overall the train was only delayed by half an hour because of "adverse weather conditions", sure then it took me 4 hours to get homw from town (16 miles), had to walk as car couldn't get up the hill of our farm track, but fair enough, we do have over 3 feet of snow here, fiestas aren't great at dealing with that! Was -10celsius today, expected going down to -18 tonight, just a typical winter really, just a bit earlier than usual this year.

As if they play that card. Ye if winter was really winter this would be 3 months long, like how my Mum says it used to be when she was a child.

[fire2burn]

The average person does cope with it, the media just likes to hype the issue to the sorts of people that believe the sky is falling in and Gordon Brown is responsible for everything.

[Fear Nothing]

(Original post by fire2burn)
The average person does cope with it, the media just likes to hype the issue to the sorts of people that believe the sky is falling in and Gordon Brown is responsible for everything.

This too. BBC are pathetic the way they make out somehow WWIII has broken out and they get the reporters out to the locations and interview the already pissed off drivers who have spent the previous night freezing their nads off in a car.

[TheSownRose]

(Original post by Fear Nothing)
A concise and really great answer. Rep to you

Why thank you.

[La Esmerelda]

Exactly!
But I think its because we're not used to it.

[Craig_D]

(Original post by Rubgish)
Essentially, we get enough snow for it to be a problem, but we don't get it often enough to know how to deal with it.

That is the perfect answer to this question.

[snowing292]

(Original post by Rubgish)
Essentially, we get enough snow for it to be a problem, but we don't get it often enough to know how to deal with it.

I think this is why. There isn't much point investing much more money into improving transport networks, when we only get snow every so often, everyone loves it, and it's usually around christmas anyway.

[oliverwilliams22]

Hi all,
Havnt had much to be honest in Wolverhampton as yet, which is the norm!

[lolimemma]

(Original post by George Agdgdgwngo)
I see what you mean with the amount of snow etc., but things are going tits up down here in Central Scotland. Glasgow Central train station is essentially closed (well it was earlier), flights are being delayed/cancelled. The main road I can see from my house has a tailback of about a mile. Earlier on the news the M8 was at a standstill. The M74 northbound at Carlisle was at a standstill. Ambulance overturned in Orkney.

The only thing I haven't seen is a mass abandonment of cars on main roads, although yesterday when my mum was coming home from work, she had to leave it in an industrial estate along with about 20 other vehicles. My dad also took over 2 hours to travel less than 10 miles coming home from work. And it's not even as though I live in a rural area, this is Greater Glasgow we're talking about.

Maybe you're just lucky to be in Inverness

My friend's flight from inverness on sunday got cancelled coz of the weather :P

(Original post by Student2806)
It was absolutely abysmal in County Durham on Saturday night Despite all the warnings that there was a load of snow coming, the council still didn't grit the roads in time. I was going to Newcastle, but we couldn't even get the car out of the street at about 6.30. My friend was on the A1(M) coming from Darlington in the middle of it all, and he said people were skidding even on the motorway. The council can say whatever they want about how they did supposedly gritted all the main roads, but we all know they're lying through their teeth...

Agree soooooooo much with this. I was on the A1 and it was a nightmare although to be fair I think it was gritted and the main problem was with snow drifting onto the road from the fields and people taking care when driving up/down hills.

That saying, we turned off at Coxhoe and the roads from there were abysmal. Nothing had been gritted and the snow was deep. We got stuck and had to push the car.

I live just South of Durham and it took us 3 hours to get back from Newcastle. Nightmare!

[Fear Nothing]

RIP the two females on that coach. Not nice news to wake up to this morning

[Samz]

it's like an ice rink outside where i am all the buses, trains and taxis are cancelled.. i just tried to walk to work and fell over so much i've just given up and come back!! so dangerous

[thunder_chunky]

A few days ago it took me some four hours to get home on a journey that normally takes just over an hour because of sever train and bus delays.

Anyway I was on the final leg of my journey on the train, and just as we left the station someone said "all this for a bit of weather eh?"

And I muttered "Imagine if we lived in Russia"

At which point another guy said "well why don't you go back there then? off and don't come back, it's people like you who are ruining this country."

At first I thought he was joking, but 15 agonising minutes later after I had told him for the umpteenth time I am not Russian, I don't look or sound like one (I have a British, London accent) I came to the conclusion he was either very tired, very drunk, or very stupid. Maybe the last two combined.

At one point he got up and walked over to me (after I mocked his stupidity and lack of humour) and threatend me.

All that for a bit of snow eh?

Ah well.


Drama

[Fear Nothing]

(Original post by thunder_chunky)
A few days ago it took me some four hours to get home on a journey that normally takes just over an hour because of sever train and bus delays.

Anyway I was on the final leg of my journey on the train, and just as we left the station someone said "all this for a bit of weather eh?"

And I muttered "Imagine if we lived in Russia"

At which point another guy said "well why don't you go back there then? off and don't come back, it's people like you who are ruining this country."

At first I thought he was joking, but 15 agonising minutes later after I had told him for the umpteenth time I am not Russian, I don't look or sound like one (I have a British, London accent) I came to the conclusion he was either very tired, very drunk, or very stupid. Maybe the last two combined.

At one point he got up and walked over to me (after I mocked his stupidity and lack of humour) and threatend me.

All that for a bit of snow eh?

Ah well.


Drama

For the love of god Some people

[letsdothetimewarpagain]

We have no snow but we have been pretty much cut off due to trains going down (there is currently one sat in my local station, frozen up) and the buses are gone too

[DeeDub]

I am pretty much snowed in as my road is too snowy to get in and out safely. My mum has had to bring a different car back from work all this week as her's is useless in the snow.

[Fear Nothing]

(Original post by letsdothetimewarpagain)
We have no snow but we have been pretty much cut off due to trains going down (there is currently one sat in my local station, frozen up) and the buses are gone too

Cabin Fever? Keep safe

[Stomm]

(Original post by Chibelta)
It's so ironic - the media's: "look what global warming's done!! no snow....there'll never be any snow...our planet is doomed..."

Then it snows.
"Look what global warming's done to us now! How ridiculous!"

Actually climatic history indicates that as average global temperatures increase, we're likely to experience much colder winters as the Atlantic Conveyor fails. In a nutshell the main reason why we don't have winters of -20 degrees C or worse as Moscow does, is because of the Gulf stream coming up from the equator which basically warms the Western Coast of Europe, and the British Isles especially. Global warming will cause this to fail as melting polar ice forces it to travel further South, IIRC hitting Spain rather than us.



So whilst average global temperatures will increase, it does not mean that we in the UK will find it any warmer, quite the reverse in fact....

[mxcs]

It's not even snowing here, the ice is pretty much thawed, but the buses have been suspended. Now I'm getting a lift into town in the other direction to get the train to give my boyfriend his gifts and I'm sure it'll take a good few hours longer to get there than it should.

The UK should at least be equipped to deal with the ice more effectively in certain areas so it doesn't mess up public transport so spectacularly..it doesn't always snow, but it stays icy in the winter for at least a couple of months so surely putting extra salt/grit down outside the major towns shouldn't be a big deal.

[Stomm]

Having driven in Sweden, Denmark and Germany during very heavy snows, well ok, most of the heavy snow was in Denmark, bloody odd that.

Anyway, studded tyres, simple as that really. In Sweden at least, and I suspect the rest of Scandinavia, studded tyres are manditory during the winter months. This is because during the winter months, if the roads aren't covered in snow, then they are likely to be covered in ice. They provide excellent grip in snowy or icy conditions, basically the difference between walking on ice with slippers, or walking on ice with metal crampons.


However on roads not covered in snow and icee studded tyres can actually damage the road surface, never mind of course shed their studs and thus causing a hazzard to other road users. Needless to say studded tyres are actually illegal in the UK, just as driving a tracked vehicle without special road tracks (with rubber bits inbedded in the links) on the road is illegal. Councils and the Highways Agency wouldn't take too kindly to having to resurface every road every Spring just because of people taking precautions against adverse driving conditions that might occur for a total of maybe four or five days a year, tops.



So basically as has been said, it basically makes no sense to prepare for the worst when it hardly ever happens. And indeed 'actually' preparing for the worst would require everyone to invest in a second set of wheels for their cars which they'd have to put on and take off five or six times throughout the winter. As we just don't get the extended periods of really cold weather, icy roads and so on that can't be solved with a little salt on the road, using chains, studded tyres and the like just makes no sense...